When Race Becomes Real

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When Race Becomes Real

Author : Bernestine Singley
Publisher : SIU Press
ISBN 13 : 0809387360
Total Pages : 353 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (93 download)

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Book Synopsis When Race Becomes Real by : Bernestine Singley

Download or read book When Race Becomes Real written by Bernestine Singley and published by SIU Press. This book was released on 2008-09-05 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Race Becomes Real is a critically acclaimed collection that pushes the boundaries of current discussions about race. In these personal and evocative essays, thirty contemporary black and white writers describe their own intimate experiences with race and discrimination, taking an unflinching look at both society and themselves. The result is an incisive and powerful anthology that rethinks what it means to be black—and white—in the modern world. Only through frank and tough conversation, Singley tells us, can America hope to realize its goals of justice and racial equality. This collection opens that much needed honest dialogue, exploring a wide range of racial experiences in relation to a myriad of topics: from crime and religion to humor, history, and desire. Readers will find within these pages examinations of the roots of racial beliefs and the origins of the language and rules that have heretofore governed discussion; analysis of the reasons behind our reticence to discuss the subject openly; and suggestions for solutions to the problems that plague open racial discourse. The writers of When Race Becomes Real demonstrate the progress that can be made when our ingrained wariness on the subject of race is abandoned, and we instead confront the issue openly and personally. Included are contributions by a variety of authors, from Pulitzer Prize winners such as Robert Coles, Leonard Pitts, and Natalie Angier to popular writers and emerging voices. In each essay the author sweeps aside the cautious rules that often dominate racial discussions to address what race really means in the twenty-first century. When Race Becomes Real directly tackles one of our most taboo subjects with bravery, wit, and emotion. Sometimes shocking, sometimes amusing but always honest, this collection encourages readers to move beyond the ineffective reluctance and objectivity that hinder contemporary conversations and in doing so forge a new path in racial consciousness.

How Real Is Race?

Author : Carol C. Mukhopadhyay
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN 13 : 0759122741
Total Pages : 362 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (591 download)

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Book Synopsis How Real Is Race? by : Carol C. Mukhopadhyay

Download or read book How Real Is Race? written by Carol C. Mukhopadhyay and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2013-12-11 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How real is race? What is biological fact, what is fiction, and where does culture enter? What do we mean by a “colorblind” or “postracial” society, or when we say that race is a “social construction”? If race is an invention, can we eliminate it? This book, now in its second edition, employs an activity-oriented approach to address these questions and engage readers in unraveling—and rethinking—the contradictory messages we so often hear about race. The authors systematically cover the myth of race as biology and the reality of race as a cultural invention, drawing on biocultural and cross-cultural perspectives. They then extend the discussion to hot-button issues that arise in tandem with the concept of race, such as educational inequalities; slurs and racialized labels; and interracial relationships. In so doing, they shed light on the intricate, dynamic interplay among race, culture, and biology. For an online supplement to How Real Is Race? Second Edition, click here.

White Fragility

Author : Dr. Robin DiAngelo
Publisher : Beacon Press
ISBN 13 : 0807047422
Total Pages : 194 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (7 download)

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Book Synopsis White Fragility by : Dr. Robin DiAngelo

Download or read book White Fragility written by Dr. Robin DiAngelo and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2018-06-26 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New York Times best-selling book exploring the counterproductive reactions white people have when their assumptions about race are challenged, and how these reactions maintain racial inequality. In this “vital, necessary, and beautiful book” (Michael Eric Dyson), antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white fragility and “allows us to understand racism as a practice not restricted to ‘bad people’ (Claudia Rankine). Referring to the defensive moves that white people make when challenged racially, white fragility is characterized by emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and by behaviors including argumentation and silence. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium and prevent any meaningful cross-racial dialogue. In this in-depth exploration, DiAngelo examines how white fragility develops, how it protects racial inequality, and what we can do to engage more constructively.

Race After Technology

Author : Ruha Benjamin
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
ISBN 13 : 1509526439
Total Pages : 172 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (95 download)

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Book Synopsis Race After Technology by : Ruha Benjamin

Download or read book Race After Technology written by Ruha Benjamin and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2019-07-09 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From everyday apps to complex algorithms, Ruha Benjamin cuts through tech-industry hype to understand how emerging technologies can reinforce White supremacy and deepen social inequity. Benjamin argues that automation, far from being a sinister story of racist programmers scheming on the dark web, has the potential to hide, speed up, and deepen discrimination while appearing neutral and even benevolent when compared to the racism of a previous era. Presenting the concept of the “New Jim Code,” she shows how a range of discriminatory designs encode inequity by explicitly amplifying racial hierarchies; by ignoring but thereby replicating social divisions; or by aiming to fix racial bias but ultimately doing quite the opposite. Moreover, she makes a compelling case for race itself as a kind of technology, designed to stratify and sanctify social injustice in the architecture of everyday life. This illuminating guide provides conceptual tools for decoding tech promises with sociologically informed skepticism. In doing so, it challenges us to question not only the technologies we are sold but also the ones we ourselves manufacture. Visit the book's free Discussion Guide: www.dropbox.com

So You Want to Talk About Race

Author : Ijeoma Oluo
Publisher : Seal Press
ISBN 13 : 1541619226
Total Pages : 214 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (416 download)

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Book Synopsis So You Want to Talk About Race by : Ijeoma Oluo

Download or read book So You Want to Talk About Race written by Ijeoma Oluo and published by Seal Press. This book was released on 2019-09-24 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this #1 New York Times bestseller, Ijeoma Oluo offers a revelatory examination of race in America Protests against racial injustice and white supremacy have galvanized millions around the world. The stakes for transformative conversations about race could not be higher. Still, the task ahead seems daunting, and it’s hard to know where to start. How do you tell your boss her jokes are racist? Why did your sister-in-law hang up on you when you had questions about police reform? How do you explain white privilege to your white, privileged friend? In So You Want to Talk About Race, Ijeoma Oluo guides readers of all races through subjects ranging from police brutality and cultural appropriation to the model minority myth in an attempt to make the seemingly impossible possible: honest conversations about race, and about how racism infects every aspect of American life. "Simply put: Ijeoma Oluo is a necessary voice and intellectual for these times, and any time, truth be told." ―Phoebe Robinson, New York Times bestselling author of You Can't Touch My Hair

The History of White People

Author : Nell Irvin Painter
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN 13 : 039307949X
Total Pages : 512 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (93 download)

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Book Synopsis The History of White People by : Nell Irvin Painter

Download or read book The History of White People written by Nell Irvin Painter and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2011-04-18 with total page 512 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Bestseller This terrific new book…[explores] the ‘notion of whiteness,’ an idea as dangerous as it is seductive." —Boston Globe Telling perhaps the most important forgotten story in American history, eminent historian Nell Irvin Painter guides us through more than two thousand years of Western civilization, illuminating not only the invention of race but also the frequent praise of “whiteness” for economic, scientific, and political ends. A story filled with towering historical figures, The History of White People closes a huge gap in literature that has long focused on the non-white and forcefully reminds us that the concept of “race” is an all-too-human invention whose meaning, importance, and reality have changed as it has been driven by a long and rich history of events.

The Racial Imaginary

Author : Claudia Rankine
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781934200797
Total Pages : 285 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (7 download)

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Book Synopsis The Racial Imaginary by : Claudia Rankine

Download or read book The Racial Imaginary written by Claudia Rankine and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Frank, fearless letters from poets of all colors, genders, classes about the material conditions under which their art is made.

White Like Me

Author : Tim Wise
Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN 13 : 1458780910
Total Pages : 390 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (587 download)

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Book Synopsis White Like Me by : Tim Wise

Download or read book White Like Me written by Tim Wise and published by ReadHowYouWant.com. This book was released on 2010-10-29 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Flipping John Howard Griffin's classic Black Like Me, and extending Noel Ignatiev's How The Irish Became White into the present-day, Wise explores the meanings and consequences of whiteness, and discusses the ways in which racial privilege can harm not just people of color, but also whites. Using stories instead of stale statistics, Wise weaves a narrative that is at once readable and yet scholarly; analytical and yet accessible.

Real Black

Author : John L. Jackson Jr.
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 9780226390017
Total Pages : 310 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (9 download)

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Book Synopsis Real Black by : John L. Jackson Jr.

Download or read book Real Black written by John L. Jackson Jr. and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2005-11-15 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York's urban neighborhoods are full of young would-be emcees who aspire to "keep it real" and restaurants like Sylvia's famous soul food eatery that offer a taste of "authentic" black culture. In these and other venues, authenticity is considered the best way to distinguish the real from the phony, the genuine from the fake. But in Real Black, John L. Jackson Jr. proposes a new model for thinking about these issues--racial sincerity. Jackson argues that authenticity caricatures identity as something imposed on people, imprisoning them within stereotypes--turning them into racial objects and inanimate things, instead of living, breathing human beings. Contending that such assumptions deny people agency--not to mention humanity--in their search for identity, Jackson counterposes sincerity, an internal and more productive analytical model for thinking about race. Moving in and around Harlem and Brooklyn, Jackson offers a kaleidoscope of subjects and stories that directly and indirectly address how race is negotiated in today's world--including tales of name-changing hip-hop emcees, book-vending numerologists, urban conspiracy theorists, corrupt police officers, mixed-race neo-Nazis, and high-school gospel choirs forbidden to catch the Holy Ghost. Enlisting "Anthroman," his cape-crusading critical alter ego, Jackson records and retells these interconnected sagas in virtuosic detail and, in the process, shows us how race is defined and debated, imposed and confounded every single day.

Facing Reality

Author : Charles Murray
Publisher : Encounter Books
ISBN 13 : 1641771984
Total Pages : 118 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (417 download)

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Book Synopsis Facing Reality by : Charles Murray

Download or read book Facing Reality written by Charles Murray and published by Encounter Books. This book was released on 2021-06-15 with total page 118 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The charges of white privilege and systemic racism that are tearing the country apart fIoat free of reality. Two known facts, long since documented beyond reasonable doubt, need to be brought into the open and incorporated into the way we think about public policy: American whites, blacks, Hispanics, and Asians have different violent crime rates and different means and distributions of cognitive ability. The allegations of racism in policing, college admissions, segregation in housing, and hiring and promotions in the workplace ignore the ways in which the problems that prompt the allegations of systemic racism are driven by these two realities. What good can come of bringing them into the open? America’s most precious ideal is what used to be known as the American Creed: People are not to be judged by where they came from, what social class they come from, or by race, color, or creed. They must be judged as individuals. The prevailing Progressive ideology repudiates that ideal, demanding instead that the state should judge people by their race, social origins, religion, sex, and sexual orientation. We on the center left and center right who are the American Creed’s natural defenders have painted ourselves into a corner. We have been unwilling to say openly that different groups have significant group differences. Since we have not been willing to say that, we have been left defenseless against the claims that racism is to blame. What else could it be? We have been afraid to answer. We must. Facing Reality is a step in that direction.

Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race

Author : Reni Eddo-Lodge
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1526633922
Total Pages : 272 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (266 download)

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Book Synopsis Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race by : Reni Eddo-Lodge

Download or read book Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race written by Reni Eddo-Lodge and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2020-11-12 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Every voice raised against racism chips away at its power. We can't afford to stay silent. This book is an attempt to speak' The book that sparked a national conversation. Exploring everything from eradicated black history to the inextricable link between class and race, Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race is the essential handbook for anyone who wants to understand race relations in Britain today. THE NO.1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER WINNER OF THE BRITISH BOOK AWARDS NON-FICTION NARRATIVE BOOK OF THE YEAR 2018 FOYLES NON-FICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR BLACKWELL'S NON-FICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR WINNER OF THE JHALAK PRIZE LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION LONGLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR A BOOKS ARE MY BAG READERS AWARD

Why Race Still Matters

Author : Alana Lentin
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
ISBN 13 : 1509535721
Total Pages : 161 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (95 download)

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Book Synopsis Why Race Still Matters by : Alana Lentin

Download or read book Why Race Still Matters written by Alana Lentin and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2020-04-22 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Why are you making this about race?' This question is repeated daily in public and in the media. Calling someone racist in these times of mounting white supremacy seems to be a worse insult than racism itself. In our supposedly post-racial society, surely it’s time to stop talking about race? This powerful refutation is a call to notice not just when and how race still matters but when, how and why it is said not to matter. Race critical scholar Alana Lentin argues that society is in urgent need of developing the skills of racial literacy, by jettisoning the idea that race is something and unveiling what race does as a key technology of modern rule, hidden in plain sight. Weaving together international examples, she eviscerates misconceptions such as reverse racism and the newfound acceptability of 'race realism', bursts the 'I’m not racist, but' justification, complicates the common criticisms of identity politics and warns against using concerns about antisemitism as a proxy for antiracism. Dominant voices in society suggest we are talking too much about race. Lentin shows why we actually need to talk about it more and how in doing so we can act to make it matter less.

Race on the Brain

Author : Jonathan Kahn
Publisher : Columbia University Press
ISBN 13 : 023154538X
Total Pages : 292 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (315 download)

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Book Synopsis Race on the Brain by : Jonathan Kahn

Download or read book Race on the Brain written by Jonathan Kahn and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2017-11-07 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Of the many obstacles to racial justice in America, none has received more recent attention than the one that lurks in our subconscious. As social movements and policing scandals have shown how far from being “postracial” we are, the concept of implicit bias has taken center stage in the national conversation about race. Millions of Americans have taken online tests purporting to show the deep, invisible roots of their own prejudice. A recent Oxford study that claims to have found a drug that reduces implicit bias is only the starkest example of a pervasive trend. But what do we risk when we seek the simplicity of a technological diagnosis—and solution—for racism? What do we miss when we locate racism in our biology and our brains rather than in our history and our social practices? In Race on the Brain, Jonathan Kahn argues that implicit bias has grown into a master narrative of race relations—one with profound, if unintended, negative consequences for law, science, and society. He emphasizes its limitations, arguing that while useful as a tool to understand particular types of behavior, it is only one among several tools available to policy makers. An uncritical embrace of implicit bias, to the exclusion of power relations and structural racism, undermines wider civic responsibility for addressing the problem by turning it over to experts. Technological interventions, including many tests for implicit bias, are premised on a color-blind ideal and run the risk of erasing history, denying present reality, and obscuring accountability. Kahn recognizes the significance of implicit social cognition but cautions against seeing it as a panacea for addressing America’s longstanding racial problems. A bracing corrective to what has become a common-sense understanding of the power of prejudice, Race on the Brain challenges us all to engage more thoughtfully and more democratically in the difficult task of promoting racial justice.

Race for Profit

Author : Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
Publisher : UNC Press Books
ISBN 13 : 1469653672
Total Pages : 364 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (696 download)

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Book Synopsis Race for Profit by : Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

Download or read book Race for Profit written by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2019-09-03 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: LONGLISTED FOR THE 2019 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST, 2020 PULITZER PRIZE IN HISTORY By the late 1960s and early 1970s, reeling from a wave of urban uprisings, politicians finally worked to end the practice of redlining. Reasoning that the turbulence could be calmed by turning Black city-dwellers into homeowners, they passed the Housing and Urban Development Act of 1968, and set about establishing policies to induce mortgage lenders and the real estate industry to treat Black homebuyers equally. The disaster that ensued revealed that racist exclusion had not been eradicated, but rather transmuted into a new phenomenon of predatory inclusion. Race for Profit uncovers how exploitative real estate practices continued well after housing discrimination was banned. The same racist structures and individuals remained intact after redlining's end, and close relationships between regulators and the industry created incentives to ignore improprieties. Meanwhile, new policies meant to encourage low-income homeownership created new methods to exploit Black homeowners. The federal government guaranteed urban mortgages in an attempt to overcome resistance to lending to Black buyers – as if unprofitability, rather than racism, was the cause of housing segregation. Bankers, investors, and real estate agents took advantage of the perverse incentives, targeting the Black women most likely to fail to keep up their home payments and slip into foreclosure, multiplying their profits. As a result, by the end of the 1970s, the nation's first programs to encourage Black homeownership ended with tens of thousands of foreclosures in Black communities across the country. The push to uplift Black homeownership had descended into a goldmine for realtors and mortgage lenders, and a ready-made cudgel for the champions of deregulation to wield against government intervention of any kind. Narrating the story of a sea-change in housing policy and its dire impact on African Americans, Race for Profit reveals how the urban core was transformed into a new frontier of cynical extraction.

Between the World and Me

Author : Ta-Nehisi Coates
Publisher : One World
ISBN 13 : 0679645985
Total Pages : 163 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (796 download)

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Book Synopsis Between the World and Me by : Ta-Nehisi Coates

Download or read book Between the World and Me written by Ta-Nehisi Coates and published by One World. This book was released on 2015-07-14 with total page 163 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • NAMED ONE OF TIME’S TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE DECADE • PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST • ONE OF OPRAH’S “BOOKS THAT HELP ME THROUGH” • NOW AN HBO ORIGINAL SPECIAL EVENT Hailed by Toni Morrison as “required reading,” a bold and personal literary exploration of America’s racial history by “the most important essayist in a generation and a writer who changed the national political conversation about race” (Rolling Stone) NAMED ONE OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL BOOKS OF THE DECADE BY CNN • NAMED ONE OF PASTE’S BEST MEMOIRS OF THE DECADE • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • O: The Oprah Magazine • The Washington Post • People • Entertainment Weekly • Vogue • Los Angeles Times • San Francisco Chronicle • Chicago Tribune • New York • Newsday • Library Journal • Publishers Weekly In a profound work that pivots from the biggest questions about American history and ideals to the most intimate concerns of a father for his son, Ta-Nehisi Coates offers a powerful new framework for understanding our nation’s history and current crisis. Americans have built an empire on the idea of “race,” a falsehood that damages us all but falls most heavily on the bodies of black women and men—bodies exploited through slavery and segregation, and, today, threatened, locked up, and murdered out of all proportion. What is it like to inhabit a black body and find a way to live within it? And how can we all honestly reckon with this fraught history and free ourselves from its burden? Between the World and Me is Ta-Nehisi Coates’s attempt to answer these questions in a letter to his adolescent son. Coates shares with his son—and readers—the story of his awakening to the truth about his place in the world through a series of revelatory experiences, from Howard University to Civil War battlefields, from the South Side of Chicago to Paris, from his childhood home to the living rooms of mothers whose children’s lives were taken as American plunder. Beautifully woven from personal narrative, reimagined history, and fresh, emotionally charged reportage, Between the World and Me clearly illuminates the past, bracingly confronts our present, and offers a transcendent vision for a way forward.

Oreo

Author : Fran Ross
Publisher : New Directions Publishing
ISBN 13 : 081122323X
Total Pages : 156 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (112 download)

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Book Synopsis Oreo by : Fran Ross

Download or read book Oreo written by Fran Ross and published by New Directions Publishing. This book was released on 2015-07-07 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A pioneering, dazzling satire about a biracial black girl from Philadelphia searching for her Jewish father in New York City Oreo is raised by her maternal grandparents in Philadelphia. Her black mother tours with a theatrical troupe, and her Jewish deadbeat dad disappeared when she was an infant, leaving behind a mysterious note that triggers her quest to find him. What ensues is a playful, modernized parody of the classical odyssey of Theseus with a feminist twist, immersed in seventies pop culture, and mixing standard English, black vernacular, and Yiddish with wisecracking aplomb. Oreo, our young hero, navigates the labyrinth of sound studios and brothels and subway tunnels in Manhattan, seeking to claim her birthright while unwittingly experiencing and triggering a mythic journey of self-discovery like no other.

A Troublesome Inheritance

Author : Nicholas Wade
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0698163796
Total Pages : 249 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (981 download)

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Book Synopsis A Troublesome Inheritance by : Nicholas Wade

Download or read book A Troublesome Inheritance written by Nicholas Wade and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2014-05-06 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on startling new evidence from the mapping of the genome, an explosive new account of the genetic basis of race and its role in the human story Fewer ideas have been more toxic or harmful than the idea of the biological reality of race, and with it the idea that humans of different races are biologically different from one another. For this understandable reason, the idea has been banished from polite academic conversation. Arguing that race is more than just a social construct can get a scholar run out of town, or at least off campus, on a rail. Human evolution, the consensus view insists, ended in prehistory. Inconveniently, as Nicholas Wade argues in A Troublesome Inheritance, the consensus view cannot be right. And in fact, we know that populations have changed in the past few thousand years—to be lactose tolerant, for example, and to survive at high altitudes. Race is not a bright-line distinction; by definition it means that the more human populations are kept apart, the more they evolve their own distinct traits under the selective pressure known as Darwinian evolution. For many thousands of years, most human populations stayed where they were and grew distinct, not just in outward appearance but in deeper senses as well. Wade, the longtime journalist covering genetic advances for The New York Times, draws widely on the work of scientists who have made crucial breakthroughs in establishing the reality of recent human evolution. The most provocative claims in this book involve the genetic basis of human social habits. What we might call middle-class social traits—thrift, docility, nonviolence—have been slowly but surely inculcated genetically within agrarian societies, Wade argues. These “values” obviously had a strong cultural component, but Wade points to evidence that agrarian societies evolved away from hunter-gatherer societies in some crucial respects. Also controversial are his findings regarding the genetic basis of traits we associate with intelligence, such as literacy and numeracy, in certain ethnic populations, including the Chinese and Ashkenazi Jews. Wade believes deeply in the fundamental equality of all human peoples. He also believes that science is best served by pursuing the truth without fear, and if his mission to arrive at a coherent summa of what the new genetic science does and does not tell us about race and human history leads straight into a minefield, then so be it. This will not be the last word on the subject, but it will begin a powerful and overdue conversation.